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Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Translated Shizen no Teki-P (Jin) Interview

ASCII.jpg editors had just interviewed Vocaloid producer & novel author Jin (Shizen no Teki-P) and I decide to translate this out of love! lol Please note that My Japanese is bad (really bad) and my English is bad too (really bad too). If there's any wrong translations do notify me! Thanks for reading :3

Jin (Shizen no Teki-P)

「Born in the Heisei era, the shocking debut of a Vocaloid producer and author of Kagerou Days」

「Only my parents came to my live performance」

Editor: Let's start the interview session, where were you born?

Jin: I was born in Hokkaido, Rishiri Island.

Editor: That's an amazing place. When did you started getting into music?

Jin: I started around 2nd year of my elementary school. I started learning the keyboard(piano). My teacher was a very kind person, said I could come over just to play the keyboard even though I don't have any lessons that day.

Editor: Oh you started music at a very young age, not only that you also formed bands at a very young age too.

Jin: Well, the population at my area back then was very small......There were only 12 students in the whole elementary school. And it's a miracle that there were 4 people who're learning music. This means that 1/3 of the students are in a band. But, when I entered high school I moved to a more populated area and I formed my band for the first time there. We did covers of NUMBER GIRL and THE BACK HORN.

Editor: Have you done live performances before?

Jin: We did have some at live houses. Around 2 places. It was a small live performance, the customers all left before a crowd gathered.

Editor: How little was the crowd?

Jin: 2 people.

Editor: 2 people....

Jin: And it was my parents.

Editor: You were lonely back then, but you continued to make music.

Jin: I majored in recording course when I entered university. I had a friend who's into fashion course, He asked me to make BGM music for fashion shows or make some music that's similar to Kasabian's

Editor: Your music style was very different back then. What about your band in university?

Jin: We were an instrumental band though, there's keyboard, guitar and sometimes vocals. As for the vocals, they were something like "Ahh~". It's something like Shiratama (?) and choir music.

Editor: So it was like post rock, how many people came for your performances?

Jin: Around 13 people.

Editor: Was 13 people considered a lot?

Jin: Quite a lot, this time my parents weren't present.

Editor: I see. So it was quite an amount of people.

Jin: But, when I was in university, I had these thougts such as "Which equipment is better for PA purposes?" or "I better look for a place for employment".

Editor: Since you had interest in recordings, did you had any intention of becoming a musician?

Jin: In my heart I thought that if I strike something good then maybe I'll manage to earn some decent income, but then, no one came for the live performances. "This won't sell! This won't do!!", back then I had these thoughts.

「My friend's brother is a Vocaloid P」

Editor: I'm assuming that 2007~2010, you were at high school or university, wasn't that NicoNico Douga's golden age? We haven't seen nor heard you back then.

Jin: Yeah, I knew NicoNico Douga about 2 years back.

Editor: I'm curious as to how you're interested in becoming a Vocaloid P (producer).

Jin: His name is Kamoshika-san. When I went to my friend's house, his brother said to me "I made the song with this" and showed me his computer. "Oh, Hatsune Miku produces these sounds, interesting!", was what I thought.

Editor: It can sing rock, post rock, any kind of rock. And that is Hatsune Miku's anime-like-voice's selling point.

Jin: In terms of synthesizer technology, it was very interesting. Although it can't pronounce nuances perfectly, but it can speak in a very fast speed. And this is impossible to achieve when compared to humans.

Editor: I see. It's amazing that you view this calmly.

Jin: And just when I decided to try out Vocaloid, I had secured a job.

Editor: Oh congratulations.

Jin: And during that time I had forgotten about Hatsune Miku.

Editor: That....doesn't seem to be good.

Jin: I received a message from Kamoshika-san, "How's the song coming along?" and I suddenly remembered about it. But, I didn't know how to upload it.

Editor: You didn't know how to upload it.

Jin: I asked Kamoshika-san to help me on this. I asked him to upload using my NND account and type the uploader comments with a text I prepared. I asked for an illustration, and then decided to make it a video with a only a fixed background. I was taught that after you upload, you can enter the lyrics using the comments.

Editor: So you debuted in the Internet world. How did you feel?

Jin: I was happy. There's numbers to show how many people listened to my song. I was not clear as to what's Mylist was back then, but I was told that it's something that shows people like my songs, there were hundreds of people who entered my song into their Mylist. I was so happy.

Editor: And previously it was only 13 people.

Jin: Yes. My working pace is quite slow, but then when I saw a lot of people listening to my song, I decided to work on my second song.

「Kagerou Days was Mami-san」

Editor: Even though you said you'd be going at a fast pace, it took about 5 months until you released Kagerou Days. Did you encountered any problems when producing your 3rd work?

Jin: Nope, my 2nd work had a lot more positive feedbacks compared to back then, and this happy feeling lingered in me for about 5 months. I was like "They listened to my song! Ohh! I did it!!!", and 5 months passed by.

Editor: That was long. your music style changed a lot if you compare your 1st and 2nd work, did you record the guitar parts?

Jin: Kagerou Days is somehow a summer-like song, it was difficult to express summer using DAW. I wanted to produce this impatient summer feeling. I had the songs written one after another, I wanted to write songs depicting a story from the start. I wanted to create suspense in each song so that they would be interested in my next work.

Editor: I see. So you already had this idea in mind to write a story when you first started.

Jin: I wanted to write a heavier song for my 3rd song, I wanted to have everything jump start from here. I uploaded the song in the morning, and after that I went to work. I had plans to stay over at a Vocaloid P's place, and it(the song) suddenly became a hot topic. The number of views were very different from before.

Editor: There's about 1.6 million views now.

Jin: It was at 3rd place in the daily rankings. Previously my highest was 23rd, so I was happy, or so I thought, I had this uncomfortable feeling and I was scared....

Editor: Eh?!

Jin: The next day, I went to the hospital and discovered that there's a hole in my lungs.

Editor: EEH?!

Jin: It seems I had pneumothorax. I was told to take a break from my job and have at least a week's rest. But during that week, the song hit 1st place and the feeling of happiness was unmatchable. "This is it, this can't be compared to my second work", was what I thought.

Editor: I actually hoped that it won't become such a famous song. I just thought that if Kagerou was so famous, won't you have any problems writing your next song?

Jin: Well, the story is important, but I don't want it end. Something like "Mami-san was eaten!" or so.

Editor: I see. Instead of "Vocaloid post rock", it had this different and unique feeling to it.

「Major debut and NicoNico Douga debut feels the same」

Editor: And, Kagerou Days went famous, and now there's even a novel.

Jin: I was contact through twitter, and I thought that "It's definitely this person, if its him, then I can rely on him!"('Him' referring to a writer) I collaborated with him to write the plot for the story. But then now I have another project to worry about. I had this rough image of writing a novel, but I don't know how to do it.

Editor: How does it feel to work on linking the music with the novel?

Jin: It feels like working on the storyboard and the music for a play.

Editor: That's a new way to describe it.

Jin: It's somehow like "To show the feelings of the protagonist, the guitar has to be played this way in this scene!" Or "There's an enemy in this scene so the music should be like this!". In a scene where a couple breaks up, there should be only 1 guitar with some vocals, or something like that. The recording was done live, it made me remember back my experiences of working in a band.

Editor: Despite that, you faced these with a very calm and collected mind. Are you a person who can handle huge pressure?

Jin: I didn't feel much pressure. 3am in the middle of the night, I called to the office staff to talk about my troubles, somehow, like a yandere girlfriend.

Editor: That doesn't sound good.....

Jin: I changed my style to pop for my 5th song( Souzou Forest), I thought I'd be doomed back then for changing my style....

Staff: But, once it's released and if there's positive feedback, come to me and say "I told you so, it is a nice song!"

Jin: Even when I feel depressed, I listened to my own songs, I felt that 'Ahh, it is good!". Having thoughts that what you wrote was good is also a good way to relieve yourself from depression.

Editor: You had pressures when writing songs, but other than that there's no any other pressure right?

Jin: The thought of having to do everything by yourself is scary, but then it'll be a surprise to all the listeners.

Editor: I see. Come to think of it, is the feeling of debuting almost the same as the feeling of 'debuting' in NicoNico Douga? And maybe that's why you don't have the feeling of 'major debut'

Jin: It's true that it feels the same. There are times when it feels scary, but maybe if the novel has great reviews and maybe I could just get that feeling of "Didn't I told you it was great!". And also my debut doesn't mean that the ending is near, it's like a turning point for me.

Editor: This project has just started though.

Jin: Our fight has just begun.

Editor: It'll seem like it's going to end if you put it that way. Thank you for the interesting talk. I look forward to your future works.